


The moon rains out her beams, and Heaven is overflow'd.

by liminalweirdo, slowlimbs



Series: when we hit the city limits don't forget me for a minute (tonight) [2]
Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Beverly Marsh & Richie Tozier Are Best Friends, Bisexual Richie Tozier, Blowjobs, F/M, Internalised Homophobia, M/M, ben and bev and domestic bliss, bev beats richie up a bit, scenes of mild drug use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-10
Updated: 2020-11-10
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:34:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27488932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/liminalweirdo/pseuds/liminalweirdo, https://archiveofourown.org/users/slowlimbs/pseuds/slowlimbs
Summary: Richie and Eddie leave the Town House, hand in hand, and make their way across the country to reconnect with old friends.
Relationships: Ben Hanscom/Beverly Marsh, Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Series: when we hit the city limits don't forget me for a minute (tonight) [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1994314
Comments: 2
Kudos: 51





	The moon rains out her beams, and Heaven is overflow'd.

**Author's Note:**

> firstly, we'd both like to say thank you to everyone who took the time to read and leave kudos and comments on the first part!  
> the title is from To a Skylark by Percy Shelley.

Richie holds onto Eddie’s hand, clutches it tight as they cross the border between Derry and the rest of the world. Like he’s afraid he’ll just disappear. But he doesn’t.

They avoid New York City as much as they can, and drive all the way up to Buffalo, following the shore of Lake Erie and, finally, stop in Cleveland for the night. Between them, they make it in fourteen hours and then, like teenagers, are barely inside their hotel room before they’re shedding their clothes. Richie fucks him against the door, curled around his back and pressing Eddie’s hands against the wood beneath one of his. They make a mess and have to clean it up. And then it’s this awful gluten free pizza Eddie insists on, and they both mean to shower, but Richie crashes hard while Eddie’s in there, singing something that sounds like Sinatra. He wakes up in the dead of night to Eds curled around his back, and the covers drawn up over them both, and he feels so fucking warm and safe that it hurts. Squeezes his heart.

He showers in the morning, and drinks too much coffee against this headache building behind his eyes, and they stop in Toledo for lunch and so they can get Eddie clothes that fit — clothes that aren’t Richie’s sweatpants.

He’s sort of sad to see them go.

Richie pays because Myra’s really on top of closing those accounts. He pays and gives Eddie a hard time because he can, because it’s funny — until Eddie comes out dressed in these skinny jeans and a very bookish sweater that makes Richie instantly hard. He has to fucking walk out of the store like that, and he covers it up by saying _“Nerd alert!”_ and poking Eddie in the chest asking _“where’s your pocket protector, nerd?”_ And then, the only thing that stops him from kissing him silly back at the car is the old guy staring at them from his parking spot across.

It’s somewhere around South Bend, Indiana that they start trying to knock together a plan. Like telling the others and... they’ve got to go to Richie’s apartment in California to just... get his shit, sort things out. Neither of them want to stay there long.

Steve, Richie thinks, is going to murder him. He feels fucking unstoppable anyway.

It’s somewhere near Illinois that they decide they need to stop somewhere, somewhere long enough to call the others and tell them what’s going on. What’s happened, somehow, against all odds. There’s a tiny part of Richie that’s scared. Scared that he’ll call and realize he’s cracked or something, but the ache in his thighs and stomach tells him different — the way he’s held himself in so tightly the last few nights, panting and sweatsoaked and lost in Eds — he tastes the way he should, now, Richie thinks. Like human and living, and something bitter like peppermint leaves, the kind you find in the woods and crush for their smell. He knows it’s real, but there’s the fear, still.

Maybe that’s what makes him call Bev while he’s waiting for Eddie to piss at some gas station on the outskirts of a suburb. The phone rings and Richie’s shaking, leaned up against the side of the convertible, because truth be told he can’t wait to tell her. He can’t wait to take away this heavy thing from his best friends — to tell them that they haven’t lost Eddie. That he’s still here. He’s still theirs.

“Richie?” There’s a rustling as Beverly moves. To her credit, she’s picked up after only half a ring, breathless and happy, thrilled to hear from him. “Sweetheart, where have you been?! Me and Ben— Jesus Christ, Richie, it’s been  _ weeks _ !” A bark, a laugh, and the sound of a door closing.

“Have you been in Derry this whole time, honey? Do you need someone to come and get you? Are you okay?” Rapid fire as she lights a cigarette, the sound of her exhale soft against the phone. She’s been more than worried. Pacing around Ben’s house in his shirts and bare feet, chain smoking out of the bedroom window, pale and drumming her fingers on every surface she touches. Thinking about Eddie. Thinking about Richie, clinging to Eddie’s body, covered in shit and slime and blood. About Richie in the quarry, sobbing into Bill's hair. “Richie darling? Are you okay?”

Because she knows what she’d do if she’d lost Ben. She knows right in the very bones of herself.

“Yeah,” he says, and it comes out winded, and he has to catch his breath. Suddenly he’s smiling so hard it hurts. “Yeah, Bev, listen, a lot of crazy shit has gone down. I just left the Town House, uh the day before yesterday. Or, I think? Maybe the day before that, but...” he’s talking fast — reminiscent of Eddie when they were young — endless spiels of hypochondriac babble. He laughs. “You should sit down, so I can tell you this.” He doesn’t wait, though, he just continues, jittery, excited. “Guess who showed up at my door at the Town House, Bevvie.”

“Pennywise.” Soft and terrified and automatic, breath coming in a shuddering rush. “Okay. Okay stay where you are. Text me your maps location and we’ll get you.” Another rustle as she stands. “Ben! Ben, honey! Get your shoes! We’ve gotta go get Richie!” It echoes through the house, the sound of her shouldering herself into a jacket. “Stay right where you are sweetheart we’re on our way. Have you called the others? They’ll come too. We’re coming R—.” But he’s talking again, talking over her.

“Wait, no, no no no,” he says, until she’s quiet. “No, it’s funny... because for a second I thought that, too, but I think we— when we killed It, something happened, or— I dunno, Derry’s a motherfucker, but something good happened, once.” A breath, tight and shallow. “It was Eddie, Bev. Eddie.”

Ben’s clattering down the steps, his eyes dark with panic, but he stops when he catches the look on Beverly’s face. ‘What?’ he mouths, coming down the last few steps. What’s going on? She shushes him, or at least makes a face like she is, eyebrows furrowing as she listens to Richie. She sits back down, lights another cigarette.

“Sweetheart, no.” Gentle, so gentle. Aching because she’s not with him. Can’t hold him. The darling little oddball she loved so much as a child. “No, he’s gone, remember?” She trails her fingers against the wood of the table, exhales smoke through her nose. “The house went down. He couldn’t have survived that, even if he was still— when we left. What have you taken, sweetheart? Tell me what you’ve taken and we’ll make it better.”

Ben feels panic rip through him, like a ringing in his ears, but he keeps his face calm. It’s all in his eyes, it always is. He crosses to the table and sits down, almost soundlessly, next to Bev, eyes fixed on her, like he can hear, somehow, what’s coming through the line.

Frustration flickers through Richie like lightning, but he gets it, no he does. He gets it. “No, I— I haven’t taken anything. I know how it sounds, but I’m-I’m fine. Seriously, I am, and— it’s real. I know it sounds crazy, but he’s fucking... here.” He takes a breath that shakes, presses on. “He woke up outside. Near the flow pipe, or whatever it’s fucking called. Where it flows out into the river. That’s what he said... Bev. He found me.” It comes out so soft.

“Honey...” she feels tears rise in her throat, colour on her cheeks. “Please stop it. Please. I know it’s hard, I know it’s so so hard but you’re hurting yourself and you’re hurting me.”

She lays a hand on Ben’s thigh, easy. It’s so easy to be here with him. Into the phone, “I know you miss him, babe. I know. We miss him, too, but he’s gone. He’s gone. You know that, deep down, right? Where are you, darling? Ben will come and get you. You can come to us, okay? You don’t have to be alone.” Richie had always hated being alone, and they’d always left him alone. She grits her teeth against the age old guilt. “Please, babe. Let us come get you. It’ll be alright.”

This— this isn’t going the way he’d thought, the way he’d hoped, and now there’s tears in her voice and  _ Fuck _ , he thinks,  _ sorry _ . “Shit. Bevvie, don’t— it’s okay. I’m okay. It’s the truth, Bev,” he says. Not mad, not even short with her, just practical. It’s the voice he uses in interviews and meetings — the one that says he’s in control of his mouth, these days. The one that says he’s grown up. The one that says he doesn’t always have jokes and wisecracks flashing past in his mind’s eye. “I always tell the truth. Look, we’re already— uh...” he cranes to see a sign, but can’t. “We’re somewhere near the border of Illinois, just passed it, maybe, I lost track. We’ll drive to where you are, just text me your address.”

“Sure thing, honey. We’ll see you soon, okay?” She hangs up and manages to key in the address and the passcode for the gate before she starts crying. Bending like she’s been shot, forehead on the heel of her hand and elbow on her knee as cigarette smoke surrounds her.

“Bev,” Ben says, and touches the top of her spine, runs his hand down over her hair. “What is it, what happened? Bev, hey,” he says, and then shifts close to wrap her in his arms. “Shh, hey.”

She swats him. She doesn’t mean to but yes. Her elbow twists her away from him and she breathes harshly, shuddering sobs, because it’s a learned behaviour. Because her whole life has been awful, painful touches masked by love.

She thought she’d moved past it but — Derry, fucking Derry. She’s crying like a child, for the children they all were once upon a time. The children who had died inside them years ago. She leans in now and rests her cheek on Ben, anywhere she can reach. “Richie s-said he s-saw Eddie. We need to contact the others. If he’s t-telling the truth it’s P-Pennywise, or-or he’s just— lost it.”

Ben starts to say something then stops, jaw clenching. “Okay... I don’t think he’s lost it, he’s...” he pulls a face and rubs his jaw. “He’s stronger than that. Richie’s always been tough, this... he seemed okay, when we left. He was okay.” He takes a breath that’s a little too shallow. “Pennywise—. It’s just what scares us. If he looks like Eddie... alive, unmarked... that doesn’t make sense.”

But, he thinks, that’s not entirely true. _You actually thought I could like someone as fat and gross and disgusting..._ But he shakes it off, blinks it away.

“Then what the fuck was that phone call about?” It’s not angry, though. Scared and frustrated, yes. But she’s never been angry at Ben. She gets up, twists and shakes out her fingers, crosses through to the kitchen to open the fridge. “I’m taking a snow day. Wine?”

“Sure,” he says, and then. “Whatever it is, he’s on his way here, right? We’ll take care of it. We’ll take care of him.” He’s already fishing his phone out of his jeans. “I’ll start calling the others.”

“You’re an angel.” She smiles at him, shaky and tear streaked, pouring two glasses before she returns to him.

Normally, she wouldn’t, but today... she holds the cigarette packet out to him, shaking out another for herself, sitting against his side as he dials. She’s so cold. The memories of Derry. Pennywise’s fingers around her throat. Poor, poor Richie.

**~**

Richie had thought, when he’d called — that maybe this would bring him crashing to reality, but it doesn’t. Her disbelief, somehow, makes him know that this is real. He knows it because the alternative is so wrong, and now he’s just waiting for Eddie to walk past the big glass windows of that gas station and come back out — cross the parking lot, light-footed as a cat. He knows him, he knows this is real. He knows it, now.

“Who was that?” As Eddie jogs up to him, bouncing on the balls of his feet, a carrier bag dangling from his arm and a pair of Objectively Terrible sunglasses balanced on his nose.

“Look what I got! They didn’t have any clip on ones so I guess you’ll just have to suffer.” He hip checks him, then tosses him a Red Bull from the bag. “Let’s get moving Trashmouth!”

“It was Bev,” Richie says, and he still feels shaky, but for different reasons, now. God, he hopes he didn’t hurt her, he didn’t mean to. He kind of feels like a fucking idiot now. He takes the Red Bull, shockingly cold in the heat, and reaches out to knock Eddie on the back of the head hard enough for the sunglasses to fall off (“Fuck!” Eddie says and scoops them back up quickly). They pile back into the car, and then Richie burns rubber.

“I told her, about you— being here,” he says, once they’re back on the highway. The Red Bull helps, zinging through his blood. So does the cracked window. “I probably shouldn’t have, fuck.”

Eddie, sunglasses on, lounges back in his seat, his mouth wrapped around the straw of an iced coffee. Eddie thinks he’s never been happier than when he’s been allowed to act like a basic bitch. “Yeah, no, that was probably—. God, you have no fucking tact, do you? You’re just a giant slobbery puppy.” But he’s leaning over the console to kiss his cheek, up his jaw, nipping at his ear. Not trying to distract him but, well.

Risk is kind of  _ fun _ , now.

“I know I don’t— hey, I am driving. Also you’re the puppy. Where’s the leash your mom gave you, anyway?” Except he’s thinking about Bev now. And Eddie’s right, he doesn’t have any fucking tact. He never did.

But, she knows that, right?

Eddie nips again, growling softly at him before Richie elbows him off playfully. He throws Eddie a glance that’s fond beneath everything. “If you want to get me a collar we can go shopping,” Eddie says as he sits back, grabbing his phone and scrolling through his music. “Where’s the aux cable?” It’s so domestic he could puke. Richie isn’t scared of him anymore. Richie isn’t worried to let him out of his sight. He offers him the end of his straw. “I got extra espresso shots.”

“I don’t fully trust you to not shove that straw down my throat,” he says, by which he means no. He’s pretty sure the combination of coffee, Red Bull, a thousand hours in the car, gas station food, and making Bev upset will result in puking his guts out eventually tonight. He reaches up to touch the place Eddie’s teeth had just been and swallows. And now he’s thinking about collars.

“Babe I only want to shove one thing down your throat, and let me tell ya - it ain’t a straw.” But he’s settling back, slurping at his coffee, vibrating slightly.

“Man, we’re gonna go see Bev!” Eddie says, “At her house! How fucking insane is that?!” Because never in a million years did he think he’d see any of their houses. “Was Ben there? Are they together now? Fuck, I love this song.” He sings along, occasionally leaning over to kiss him, unable to keep his hands off him for long. Because he needs to reassure himself that he’s still there.

“Man, you are fucking wired already,” Richie laughs out loud. 

**~**

Eventually they finds Bev’s place — hers and Ben’s, and Richie thinks it was easier to be on the highway with Eddie, but he wants to see them, still. Wants them to know everything’s okay. Still, he feels strange and jittery (but that might just be the Red Bull he gunned earlier. It’s a gorgeous building, all glass windows, and about ten thousand stars overhead. “Okay. Yeah this is fuckin’ wild,” Richie says, looking up at them as he turns the car off. The headlights go out.

But the lights on in the house are soft, gently illuminating the night and it’s strange but Richie thinks that he can tell that Bev lives here. Like if he’d half-forgotten her, like he had for so much of his life — robbed, all of them, from the friendships they’d made — he would stop and think that it looked familiar.

He looks over at Eddie and says “Ready, Spaghetti?” and crooks a smile at him.

“Born ready.” He’s swinging himself out of the godawful car, stretching as much as he can and stifling a yawn, picking up their gas station shopping (and trash, most of which had been thrown at Richie when he’d tried to change Eddie’s playlist), and giving him a thumbs up.

Richie follows Eddie up to the house, thinking that he’s always been braver. Maybe the bravest. Eds still doesn’t have any of that product in his hair — it was with his stuff — and Richie likes it, although he thinks the way Eddie pushes it back is cute, too. Still, as they reach the step, he reaches out and musses Eddie’s hair up. Maybe he just wants an excuse to touch him. He found thousands of ways to do that, as a kid. He rings the bell.

**~**

Inside the house is quiet, lights dimmed, an empty bottle of wine on the counter. Sweet, lovely, steady Ben. Beverly sighs from her spot with her head in his lap.

“I’m sorry I cried all over you.”

“Don’t be stupid,” Ben says, gently. He’s running his fingers over her hair, watching it change copper in the light. “It’s been hard lately. For all of us. At least we’ll be together,” he says and thinks: t _ his time around _ .

Nodding, she sits up at the sound of the bell and presses her forehead against his mouth before leaving to answer the door.

**~**

“Richie—.” Her breath catches in her throat and her stomach flips. Richie. And Eddie. And Richie’s hand in Eddie's hair and  _ Eddie Eddie Eddie.  _ “... what?” breathed, scared, taking a step back before anger rolls across her shoulders. Richie is grinning, grinning, grinning - and then his face falls. She watches Eddie take half a step back, then looks back to Richie. “What. The.  _ Fuck _ ?”

“Yeah, I dunno,” Richie says. “But that was pretty much my reaction, too.” He looks at Eddie who’s somehow ended up behind him, when did that happen? There’s a movement behind Bev, and then Ben steps into the light and Richie tips his chin to him. “Hey. Look what the cat dragged in,” he says, pointing a thumb at Eddie, and starting to smile again — fuck, can’t help it. It’s like magic. He almost wants to cry again, because this— he maybe doesn’t deserve this, but the others do. The others deserve Eddie back. Eddie deserves to be here, to live, to be happy. To drink iced coffee with stupid sunglasses on. It thrills through him again. He doesn’t know if it’ll ever stop.

“Holy shit,” Ben says, almost to himself.

There’s a moment in which Beverly wants to hug him. Wants to hug both of them.

But she doesn’t. She’s tender as she takes Richie’s glasses off and hands them to Ben (ignoring Eddie’s sheepish ‘hi, guys’), cocks an arm back and cracks Richie once, hard, across the bridge of his nose.

“ _ Look what the cat dragged in?!” _ She’s yelling, slapping at his shoulders and arms and chest. “Look what the fucking  _ cat dragged in, you motherfucker?! _ ” Crying and yelling as she feels Eddie panic behind Richie, not knowing what to do. “Next time you put him on the  _ goddamn fucking phone! _ ”

“Ow— ow!” Richie yelps, backing up, backing into Eddie. He brings his arms up over his face, shoulders hunched against the onslaught “Bev— jesus, I know, I’m s— ouch, I have no tact, I’m sorry! Ben!”

But behind her, Ben’s laughing. He just shakes his head at Richie.

Richie tastes something copper, heavy, because he’s bleeding, his nose is bleeding, and a few drops slip past his lips and splatter onto the stone step at his feet. “Ow— okay, ow, uncle.”

“And  _ you— _ .” She rounds on Eddie, who squeaks and steps backwards so quickly he falls on his ass. “You.” She’s crying again, hot angry tears.

“Hi Bev.”

“Don’t you fucking ‘Hi Bev’ me you little monster.” Beverly snaps, but softens, hands clasped hard over her mouth. “You  _ died _ . We  _ saw _ it.”

_ Nothing in Derry ever really dies. _

And then Eddie is wheezing under her weight, the pair of them a tangled pile of limbs in the grass as she holds onto him.

Richie’s pinching his nose with two fingers, and he looks back at the Ben shape in the entryway. “Sorry,” he says, trying not to bleed onto his shoes or his shirt. She really cracked him. Ben holds out his glasses and Richie takes them, puts them on one handed. “It started to feel like a dream,” he admits, softly. Maybe so the other two can’t hear.

Ben hears him anyway. “Looks like it isn’t,” he says, and then reaches out to him, wraps an arm around him. “We were worried.”

“I was fine,” Rich lies. Because he wasn’t. “Can I have a cloth or something?” he asks, and Ben leads him in to get him something from the kitchen.

The dog goes fucking nuts, as dogs do, streaking out of the house through Ben’s legs to throw itself into the laughing pile of of people in the front yard. It sobers them up pretty quickly, Beverly clasping Eddie’s hands in both of hers as she pulls him through the house.

In the kitchen, the sight of blood on Richie’s face makes something fearful quake in her.  _ Just like your father. _

“Don’t worry Bev. He deserves it.” Eddie grins, and oh. Oh Eddie. All her boys okay. Everyone but Stan.

She nods, kisses Eddie’s nose, and reaches to squeeze Richie’s arm. “I’m sorry, Rich, here. Come here.” She pulls him to stand over the sink. “Ben, honey, could you get me the first aid box?”

Ben disappears. Like a fucking shadow, while Richie’s saying “Hey, fuck you, Eddie.”

Without skipping a beat Eddie responds with “Fuck you too, pal,” and hops up to sit on the counter as he looks around, leaning down to scratch the Shepherd behind the ears.

“No, really, it’s fine,” Richie’s telling Bev, “I just need like a napkin or something,” but he leans into her for a second.  _ Sorry _ . She looks like she’s been crying. Richie catches her eyes for a moment and says “Thanks for not breaking my glasses when you broke my face.”

“Yeah I wanted you to be able to see the damage I caused.”

Eddie’s grinning so hard he’s worried his face is going to fall off, his hand seeking Richie’s instinctively.

Beverly pretends not to notice, engrossed in helping Richie stop the flow of blood. “Eddies right though. You did deserve a beat down. As if you just—. What a way to fucking break the news, Rich. I’ve been googling insane asylums.”

“I mean, it might be a good idea anyway,” Eddie laughs, and trails his fingertips over the back of Richie’s hand.

Richie’s stomach flips over, and it has nothing to do with the blood or the Red Bull, or Bev’s anger, which is scary enough. “Hey, if anyone should be going to an insane asylum, it’s the guy who can’t shut up about staph infections and greywater.” The tendons in his hand twitch, and he draws it away, but not before he flips it palm up, catches the tips of Eddie’s fingers in his own for a split second. He immediately feels like an asshole for pulling away, and then he isn’t entirely sure what to do with the movement. He settles for reaching down to the dog, and gets slobbered over as it searches for food and, finding nothing, clicks off across the tile to find Ben.

“Maybe it’s the guy who just can’t fucking shut up.” Eddie fires back immediately, hurt flashing in his eyes as he grins and watches at Richie. “Concern about illness is one thing but when you’re fucking obsessed with sleeping with our mothers, it’s quite another, man.”

“Just your mom, Eds,” Richie says, something clenching in his chest.  _ I didn’t mean that _ , he thinks, like maybe Eddie will develop telepathy or something.

Beverly aches with it. With how much she loves them both. With how much they clearly love each other. She’ll confirm it with Ben, later, she thinks. After another bottle of wine.

“Are you hungry? We haven’t had dinner yet. We were thinking, like, poverty tapas?” What she means is cheese, meat and fruit. Opens the fridge to busy herself, calling up the stairs again.

Ben appears with first aid, and Richie, whose eyes had been locked on Eddie, looks away to accept the proffered gauze. He literally stuffs some cotton into his nose, uses the sink to wash his face and hands. There’s blood on his shirt, but it’s mostly dried. “Here,” Ben says, and gives him a glass of water.

**~**

Ben hugs Eddie when there’s a second. Doesn’t let him go right away. “Jesus... how did this happen? God, it’s so fucking good to see you.”

That’s nice, Eddie decides, closing his eyes and leaning into the easy comfort. “I have no fucking idea, man.” Against his shoulder, hands connected around his ribs. “Like genuinely no clue. I don’t remember anything from before two days ago. I just woke up in the creek — by the Barrens?” He shakes his head.

Richie doesn’t want them to know.

Richie doesn’t want to call him his boyfriend.

“And the last I knew you were all at the Town House. And it was only this fucking loser left there,” Eddie says, eyes on Richie.

Richie, though, has turned to help Bev prepare things and doesn’t meet his gaze. He’s trying to make up for fucking up over the phone.

Ben lets Eddie go. To Richie: “I thought you had a show.”

“Yeah, Reno. I cancelled it. It didn’t feel right,” Richie says, “After...” He wonders what would’ve happened if he hadn’t stayed. Even if Eddie had contacted all of them again, he wonders if it would have gone the way it did. And suddenly he’s thinking of kissing him, kissing him on the corner of the mouth, that first time. He sort of freezes there, knife poised above the block of cheese, staring vaguely in the direction of Eddie’s shoes, not quite seeing anything. “Hey, um...” he begins, with every intention of saying something about what’s been happening between them, where they’ve been, what they’ve said, but the words stick in his throat. It was easier on the bridge, in Derry. Easier in the dark.

“Well, I’ll go and get the spare room made up for you.” Beverly says. “Ben, could you?” She gestures to the chopping board, and disappears up the stairs. Beverly has always found it easy to skirt around her friends’ insecurities. And this is no different. She’s known Richie has been in love with Eddie since the first time they met as a group, she’s known the same about Eddie for slightly less time.

Eddie breathes out, a whoosh of air, starting to tidy the first aid things. 

“So. You and Bev, huh?” He raises his eyebrows at Ben and smirks. “I see she took off the wedding ring, I’m sure Richie’s face is pleased about that.”

“My face is pleased about that,” Richie says, and his eyes flicker to Eddie’s hands. Eddie’s wedding ring, still catching the light. He thinks oh, that’s weird, but maybe it isn’t. Maybe it’s only fair.

Ben smiles at Eddie, and looks away, suddenly shy. He keeps his eyes down at his hands as he finishes preparing the food. “I guess it just happened this way,” he says, quietly.

“Come on, man, I saw that coming a mile away,” Richie says. “She was always nicest to you.” He’s teasing. Bev’s always been the best, to all of them. “Lucky dog.”

The actual dog’s whining at his hip, begging for cheese. “No, not you,” Richie tells it.

Lucky dog. Eddie swallows, regains his smile after it slips and shatters on the floor. “Happened what way? Hmm?” Leans over to prod Ben with a toe. “Come on you big romantic you. We’re all pals here. You can spill. We’ll only make fun of you for the next ten years.”

_ Lucky dog. _

Of course Beverly would be the first one Richie would want to see.

_ Lucky dog _ .

Eddie swallows again.

“Ask Beverly,” Ben says. “I was just swept up in it.” In her. January embers. Beverly Marsh. Like it could’ve gone any other way.

“Boring.” Eddie makes a face at Ben as Beverly returns, in her pyjamas and slippers, hair pulled back and well.

Yeah.

_ Lucky dog _ .

Eddie has to look away. Because he could never look like that. So effortless and relaxed in her beauty as she touches Ben’s back. He can’t touch Richie like that. Richie shies away every time he tries.

Richie surreptitiously feeds the dog some cheese, only half-listening to the others. “Have you got anything to kind of... take the edge off?” he asks, waving at his face, but it’s not that that he wants numbed. It’s the way he feels cornered. He tells himself it’s from driving all day, from so much change in the span of 72 hours.

“We have some weed, honey, if you think that might help.” She says, leaning over Ben’s shoulder to see his work. “Don’t feed him cheese. If he gets the shits you’re cleaning it up.”

Eddie pointedly doesn’t look at the strip of skin that’s exposed as she reaches up to get a square tin from on top of the fridge. He wonders if Richie looks. If Richie regrets him already.

_ Lucky dog _ .

**~**

Bev, true angel, breaks out the weed and they smoke and eat, and Richie, after taking the gauze out of his nose, begins to feel like everything’s... normal. They’ve gone back to usual — it’s him and Bev on one side of the table, Eddie and Ben on the other. They’re diagonally across from one another — always opposite sides of the group, and maybe Richie’s gaze lingers on him longer than it should. Back to usual, except it’s harder than it should be to catch Eddie’s eyes.

Still they laugh and joke around like they always did, and Richie’s made friends with the dog who doesn’t shit in the house, thank god, and that gives him something to do with his hands, scratching its ears and petting it gently and thinking that he can still feel Eddie’s touch on the back of his hand like a brand.

Afterwards, they go to the guest bedroom Bev’s gotten ready for them. It’s just one bed. Obviously, but they, all of them, have shared beds before. It shouldn’t seem weird under any circumstances. But it does, ‘cause Eddie’s distant, different. The energy between them’s changed. “Hey...” Richie begins, once they’ve closed the door and Bev and Ben’s voices have faded off somewhere else in the house.

“Hmm?” Eddie’s in the middle of pulling his jumper and trousers off, half dressed as he digs through the duffle bag Richie brought up from the car, his sunglasses folded on the bedside table. “Do we have anymore clean sweats?” Because he’s been cold, mostly, since Derry. Feels like the chill has gotten under his skin and settled in his bones.

He doesn’t really look at Richie, not quite meeting his eyes as he pulls a pair out and sniffs them. “I mean, they’re not spotless but they’re not bad. These’ll do.” Eddie doesn’t... blame them. Either of them, Bev or Richie. It’s a shitty thing to do to Ben, but people do shitty things all the time, he thinks. He wriggles into the soft material and pulls back the covers on the bed, smooths a hand over the sheets. “She didn’t have to do this.”

“No, she didn’t,” Richie agrees, and realizes he has no fucking idea how to cross the room and get into bed with him now. He doesn’t know how to do that when kissing isn’t involved.

So he pretends it’s easy. He shuts his mind down, pulls off his shirt and Eddie’s taken his only other pair of sweatpants so he pulls on the ones Eddie wore when he first came back and tries not to shiver at the feeling. He drops onto the bed. “Move over,” and gets under the blankets and — christ, there. At least he can do that. He doesn’t look at Eddie though, or turn into him or do anything at all. Just stays still like he’s trying to camouflage himself into the bedspread, then he reaches and shuts off the light.

“Why are you being so weird, asshole?” Richie asks, some time later, into the darkness and the quiet and the not touching.

But Eddie doesn’t answer. He’s not asleep — can’t sleep, not with Richie not curled around him or him curled around Richie — but blinking wetly into the dark. Face half pressed into the pillow, breathing like he’s sleeping, hoping Richie will drop it. Just drop it and they can leave tomorrow and the tension will leave his spine.

The jealousy.

He’s not being weird. Richie is. Richie flinching away from his touch, not looking at him properly, looking at Bev instead.

_ Lucky dog _ .

Richie furrows his brow into the darkness but doesn’t say anything else. He hasn’t even taken his glasses off, thought maybe he would at least be able to clear the air between them or... something. Instead he lies so still, breathing so shallowly — trying not to make a sound — and tries to feel tired, but he doesn’t. He doesn’t know how long he just lies there, but when he’s sure Eddie is asleep, he gets up as quietly as he can. The bed isn’t huge, so he’s right on the edge, not touching the other man.

He slips out easily, finds his shirt, and finds his way to the hallway in the dark. He pulls his shirt on there, in the dim light coming from somewhere down the hall, then he follows it, that light. He’s thinking he wishes he hadn’t quit cigarettes because he desperately wants one now, but maybe there’s an opened bottle of whiskey or even a glass of water and a space where he can feel like he doesn’t want to crawl out of his own fucking cowardly skin.

He knows what this is about, he thinks. Maybe he just needs some fresh air.

He finds Bev instead, in the soft glow of a single lamp and leans against the doorway, arms around himself because he doesn’t have pockets to try to disappear into.

“Hey,” he says, soft, not wanting to startle her. He can smell her cigarette.

“Hey yourself.” Softly, eyes watching the stars through the patio doors. “Did you want one?” She gestures to the packet and the lighter, wrapped up in one of Bens robes. “Couldn’t you sleep?”

He shrugs about sleeping, but goes to her, takes a cigarette out of the pack and lights it.

“I quit like years ago,” he tells her, taking a heavy drag. It’s good, it smells like Bev, it’s comforting. He settles against the opposite door, adjusts his glasses. “What about you? Don’t still have nightmares, do you?”

“Not like I used to.” She shrugs, looking at him in the dusk light. “Not here.” The garden is dark beyond the circle of light from the doors, but the dark doesn’t scare her. The most horrific things happened to her in the dead of day.

“I’m working, technically.” She points to a drawing table, covered in artwork. “Next year's fall line is due, but I keep drawing Derry.” Blows a smoke ring at him, then a smaller one.

“Penny for your thoughts?”

Neither of them hear Eddie on the stairs, crouching with the dog. He’d woken up as soon as Richie had moved. Now all he can do is squash his stomach with his fist against the nausea. All he can think is _ I knew it I knew it I knew it. _

Richie smiles at her smoke rings. Bev’s always been cooler than all of them. Even Bill didn’t understand why she chose to hang around with them at all.

But the smile fades quickly as he actually thinks about his thoughts. He thinks he could crack some joke about some people paying seventy-five bucks to hear his thoughts, but he doesn’t write his own material, so... it’s a bad joke. Instead he takes another drag, quiet, thinking, and then says “It’s so just crazy, Bev. I mean I thought—” he swallows. Thought he’d missed his chance, thought he’d lost him, forever. He smiles through it as he says “Thought I’d lost him, you know?”

“Why do you think I was ready to come and get you, honey?” Sugar sweet, her hand closing around his wrist to rub her thumb against his pulse. “I know how I’d feel if I’d lost Ben.”

And she’s so, so sweet. Eddie almost feels guilty about thinking the things he’s thought. It’s Bev. She’d never do that to Ben. When Bev loves she does it with her whole heart.

Richie looks at her, something flickering between them — this understanding. “You seem really happy,” he tells her. “That’s... I’m really happy for you. And thank god, I won’t have to watch our Ben pining anymore,” he teases.

And he thinks that he’s such an asshole, for letting her take his hand, letting her touch him, when he couldn’t with Eddie. But when Eddie touches him, Richie feels like he fucking lights up. Like everyone can see it, (dirty little secret) — see what he feels. And he knows that what he feels is good, and real, but he doesn’t know, yet, how to separate it from the shame. Spit flying thick from a clown’s lips, those awful eyes that knew.

“I could say the same about you.” She says gently, eyes steady on him. “I think you hurt his feelings.”

And Eddie catches his breath, because Richie did, and so did his stupid brain, and now he feels ridiculous. The dog grumbles next to him and he buries his face in the fur.

She’s scary, the way she just knows things. She’s scary and Richie loves her fucking desperately because she doesn’t make him need to say it. He winces and says “I didn’t mean to.” But that’s not good enough. “I—” he takes a drag, one eye half-closed against the smoke, and breathes out shakily. “I know it’s just you and Ben... I know none of us would care, but I can’t— I can’t not care. I spent fucking forever thinking he didn’t. And then fucking forever thinking that I was... wrong. Like, on the inside? Jesus, that’s not what I mean...”

But it’s clear that he hasn’t thought about it, hasn’t let himself get too close, even in his own head, to thoughts like this. “I  _ love _ him,” he tells her. “so much. It hurts, how much. But it was safer when it was just mine, and no one... saw. I was scared you’d all look at me different. Bill and Stanley... and I knew you wouldn’t, but I was always thinking, you know, what if? And now he’s back, and everything just— I mean, we... I can’t catch up. I’m still half afraid he’s going to disappear.” He breathes a laugh he doesn’t feel, and he can’t look at her.

“Richie...” it hurts her, how oblivious and insecure he is. It hurts that he thinks these things about himself. “We... we know, honey. All of us. Me and Ben— we’ve known for a while, at least, but you can’t—.” She sighs, leans over to kiss his cheek. 

“You don’t cry the way you did in the Quarry without loving someone. And losing them.” Because that’s what she has nightmares about, now, when she has them. About Ben alone suffocating in the dirt with her poem on his lips. “There’s never been anything wrong with you. Never. There wasn’t when you were a teenager and there isn’t now.”

“I know that. Like, theoretically.” He takes a deep breath. “I know... But you know, when we came back, after that kid was killed in Derry, that Adrian Mellon kid, and in the paper his— his boyfriend said he was targeted first. That they threw him over the side of the bridge before... I mean, the papers said he drowned, but...” but they all know what happened. “Sometimes I think, Jesus christ, you know? What if that happens to Eds. Or me.” His hands are shaking. “I fucking hate it,” he says, with too much feeling, but he’s still speaking soft. “I hate thinking that this could... that something like that... just because someone, the wrong person, saw us together. I dunno, fuck, it’s a lot. Jesus.”

“If Love was easy it wouldn’t be worth doing, honey.” She exhales smoke, brings his trembling hand up to kiss it. “Have you said any of this to Eds?” Because she knows he hasn’t. Knows he wouldn’t have. “You know what he’s like. If you haven’t explicitly said to him what you’re worried about, he’ll be up in his own head with his mom thinking he’s done something wrong.” She’s being gentle, but truthful. “While you’re in my house you live the way you want to,” then, wickedly, repeating Eddie from earlier, “we’ll only make fun of you for the next ten years.”

He laughs. “If he hasn’t given up on me already.” But he smiles at her, crooked and sweet. “Thanks, Bev.” And then he’s down to the end of the cigarette already, and he reaches over to butt it out, then straightens up. “But seriously, I’ve already fucked up so many times. Like in between, uh, fucking each other’s brains out, every time I open my mouth, it’s some new disaster.”

His heart’s beating all wrong, palpitating in his chest, because he was scared to say it, so he made it a joke. He knows Bev sees right through him, and that’s fine, he thinks. Maybe he needs her to. “I told him I wasn’t going to call him my boyfriend and he looked at me like I’d just slapped him across the face...” He groans, pushing his glasses up to rub his eyes. “I just meant— it feels so trite. Like, that word— boyfriend’s like I picked him up at a bar two weeks ago, and now sometimes we go out to eat dinner and then fuck. It’s a shit word,” he says. “He’s— jesus. I mean, Bev, he’s everything. How do you put a word to that? And of course, I couldn’t say any of that, then, because my brain fucking short-circuited and then I forgot.”

Until just now — until he remembered that Mellon kid’s boyfriend.

She laughs, loud and wild, until she’s crying with it. “Jesus fucking Christ Trashmouth.” Giggles and giggles and giggles, shaking her head. “I bet you said it like that as well.  _ I’m not gonna call you my boyfriend. _ ” Bev can mimic him quite well now. “No fucking wonder you feel like you’re fucking up.” She giggles again. “You wanna know what you do? When you hate a word that might be a necessity in describing someone you’re boning and have feelings for?  _ You put up with it _ or you  _ find an alternative _ , you nutcase.”

“Yeah, I’m going to call him a pain in my ass. Wait, no, not— that one wasn’t a joke, and don’t you dare, Bev.” But she’s right. She’s always right. Thank the universe for fucking Beverly Marsh.

“You know you need to use lube, right? Are you practicing safe sex?” But she’s just ribbing him, now, pointy elbows digging at his stomach. “I hope you’ve been tender with him, the poor little flower.” Then, leaning against him, eyes closed; “I call Ben my other half, when I talk about him with people. I don’t mind boyfriend, either.”

He puts his arm around her, puts his chin in her hair for a moment, then kisses her temple — affection he had, but didn’t know what to do with as a kid. It feels so natural, with her, like this. So maybe he’s not as much of a fuckup as the thought. “Might want to wash that,” he tells her. “I kissed Eddie’s mother with this mouth.”

“You’ve kissed Eddie since, and I think by osmosis you’re clean now.” She squeezes him around the middle, comfort, and stubs her cigarette out. “I know it’s hard and scary, honey. But if you love each other it’s worth the hard and scary parts, right? At least you know you always have a home in him.”

And on the stairs, Eddie is crying. He doesn’t mean to be, but he is. And he wants to be brave, so he is. He tiptoes down the remainder of them to plod down the hall and fall into Richie from behind.

Richie jumps, startled at the touch, and hisses out this, “Jesus,” and then “Eddie,” and he’s shifting, they both are, to pull him between them, the three of them in this little semi-circle. And he doesn’t think, this time, about who’s watching, because it’s just Beverly, and she’s right. Richie cups Eddie’s face with one hand, the cheek that used to be split by a blade, and wipes at the tears. “What’s wrong, you scared of the dark?” he teases, and then pulls him into his chest, kisses his forehead, eyes shut tight.

Eddie laughs against his throat, eyes closing, pressing a kiss to his jaw. “Yeah I’m fucking terrified that you’re gonna jump out at me from it and I’ll have to look at your stupid face.”

He sniffs, wipes his nose on his (Richies, because you’d have to pry the huge shirts from his cold dead hands with a crowbar) sleeve. “No. I’ve been an idiot all night. Thought you two were having an affair behind our backs.”

“That is idiotic. That would be like making out with my creepy pervy uncle.” Bev frowns at him playfully. “I’m disgusted and you have to tell Ben why I’ve dried up like the Sahara next time we have sex.”

“Sorry, Bev.”

“I guess I forgive you.” She shakes cigarettes out of the packet and passes them round, lighting Eddie’s off the end of hers. “Y’all have my blessing, anyway. As long as I get to be maid of honour.”

“Hold on, I’m the pervy uncle?” Richie’s saying, “If anyone’s creepy and pervy it’s Eddie. He wears sweater vests.” Not entirely true. He holds out his hand for the lighter and lights his own, one hand closed tight in the back of Eddie’s shirt. “Want me to get your inhaler, Eds? Delicate flower that you are.”

“I have a  _ panic disorder _ , fuckhead, I’m not going to choke out on a cigarette.” He grumbles, watching Beverly blow smoke rings the way she used to in the Clubhouse.

“Yeah, you’re the pervy uncle.” Eddie says, “Those Hawaiian shirts.” Beverly grins at him.

“I see you in a Hawaiian shirt and I hear  _ Come sit on Uncle Richie’s knee, Bevvie, give Uncle Richie a kiss _ .”

“This relationship is over,” Richie says, even as he pulls slightly at Eddie’s shirt at his lower back, leans his hip into him. “I’m going to sue you for defamation of character. Give me your phone, Bev, I have to call my lawyer.”

“Oh you’re gonna run off back to my mom are you?” Eddie shoots back, digging his spare hand in at his ribs to make him squirm. The sun is coming up, reds and yellows over the yard, and Beverly sighs.

They both look so tired.

“Get back to bed you pair of gay trash cans.” She flicks Eddie on the nose, Richie on the forehead, yawning and stretching herself. “We’ll wake you up for brunch.”

**~**

Back in the bedroom, Richie sits heavily on the edge of the bed. He is fucking tired. He feels it now that the anxiety’s fading. His eyes find Eddie and he watches him, somewhat myopically. “We need to get you some more clothes. Tomorrow I’m forcing you into one of these shirts. Also, they’re not Hawaiian, they’re patterned. As soon as Eddie’s in arm’s reach, he reaches out to take his wrist, fingers sliding down to his palm, where the scar used to be.

“I’d rather wear one of Bev’s dresses.” Eddie snipes, using his other hand to clutch at what he’s wearing. “I refuse to buy pyjamas. I’m sleeping in your shit and you can’t stop me.” He pulls himself closer, rests his forehead against wonderful solid shoulder. “I wish you’d just said, dickhead. I’ve been eating myself alive thinking you just... you were ashamed of me or something.”

“Well, that’s because you’re an idiot,” Richie says, practically, pushing a hand into his hair. “Also I love you like fucking crazy, you prick. I’m sorry I’m such a fuckup.”

“If you’re a fuckup you’re my fuckup.” Eddie rests his chin on his shoulder, blows gently against his ear. “And I love you, too. Obviously.” Brings a hand up to fall through the curls on the back of his head, shifting to kiss his collarbone. “I’m sorry I acted like an idiot tonight.”

“Me too.” He grins and then grabs hold of him, pulls him around and onto the bed, trapping him between bed and wall. “It’s never you, Eds, if I’m ashamed. It’s... I’m working on it.” He kisses him, says. “Hm. That’s weird.”

“What is? That you’re working on your bullshit?” He’s kissing back, can’t help it, would have kissed him hours ago when he was still angry. Puts both hands on Richies shoulders to hold onto him and sighs into his mouth.

“No, it’s weird that you sort of... taste like your mom,” Richie says, dissolving into laughter as he says it.

“Fuck you.” Eddie leans over, up, biting down hard on his bottom lip and rolling to straddle his hips and pin him down. “Why am I even attracted to you I’m gonna go get in between Ben and Bev. Fucker... And you know I don’t care if we do get shit on, right?”

Richie’s still laughing, but that sobers him up a little too quickly. “I care if you get thrown into a river,” he tells him. “Because then I’d have to kill someone. Else.”

Eddie hums softly. “I’m glad you weren’t there when Bowers—. You know. My face. I don’t think I would have been okay with being vomited on by a leper and you in the same damn day.”

Richie breathes a laugh. “Did the leper vomit on you? I definitely do not want to be kissing you, then,” he says. He says it right before he drags him down to kiss him, sighing against his mouth. Christ, it’s like— it calms him, kissing. Makes him forget there’s horrible shit out there in the world. Lepers and clowns and deadlights. Homophobic assholes.

“Pennywise pretending to be a leper,” he clarifies against his tongue, letting himself be dragged and pulled and  _ Richie Tozier _ is kissing him. He’s slower to catch up, he realises, his breath getting caught in his throat as his kisses turn hungrier. Because it’s Richie. It’s his Richie and he can call him his Richie. “I’ll never get bored of this, can you just pay me your big comedian bucks to be kissed by you all the time please?”

“Shh,” he says, “shut up while I’m kissing you,” and he bites down on his lip as he pulls him over him completely, arches his hips up into Eddie’s. There’s something illicit about it — the others close by. He lets his fingers slide, so softly, up over Eddie’s throat.

“Yes  _ sir _ .” He mumbles, mocking, lifting his chin so Richie’s hand slots around his neck, eyelashes fluttering as he sighs and just relaxes. Goes boneless on top of him, colour on his cheekbones, mouth going slack and wet against his. “Can’t believe you found my weakness.”

Richie gets goosebumps, all down his arms. He squeezes, a little, not enough to stop his breath, but enough to hint at it. That he could, if he wanted to. It’s hard to kiss him when he’s talking. “Beep beep, Eddie,” he whispers, and smiles against his lips. He presses his thumb into the soft pulse just under his jaw, and above his Adam's apple.

“Beep beep yourself.” But it has the desired effect. He shuts up and allows himself to be kissed, framing Richie’s head with his forearms, hands stroking flat over his hair as he presses their noses together.

It’s nice, being with Richie like this. It has the taste of something long lost. Of teenagers stealing moments on golf courses and in hammocks. He’s transported back there whenever Richie kisses him like this, whenever he’s warm and soft against him. In his mouth. Under his fingers. Realer than any clown, any placebo, any wife he could have chosen. Tastes like weed and tobacco and coffee, of salt and toothpaste, of the godawful nicotine gum he likes. Eddie’s heart gives a weak little flutter, and he tries so hard but tears spring up again. Always crying. Crybaby.

Richie doesn’t notice right away, but there’s this quick little intake of air that sounds  _ sorry _ of damp and Richie pushes him back — pushes him back by the throat, but gently. “Eds,” he laughs, whispers it, but his eyes are concerned. “What?” He twists, gets on his side, and gets Eddie on his side and wraps his arm around him. It’s better that way, anyway, he thinks. God, he’s tired. He didn’t notice until Bev said it.

“No I’m fine, I’m fine.” He giggles, snottily, still pressing in close. “Happy tears. Really fucking happy tears. You’re Richie Tozier and I’m Eddie Kaspbrak and we’re _kissing_.” The giggle goes high pitched and hysterical for a moment then mellows again. “And I love you.”

“I’m kissing, you’re talking,” Richie says, and he presses his mouth to his forehead, kisses his nose, lips brushing over his eyebrow, his wet lashes. “You’re so gross,” he breathes, “you’re like wet, dude,” and kisses his mouth, probably gets snot on him and doesn’t care in the slightest. He slides closer, slotted against him, around him, one leg between Eddie’s. He reaches down and drags the messed up covers over them both. “You just like getting dirty, secretly,” This he says into Eddie’s shoulder. “Kissing the Trashmouth.”

He makes a noise like he’s blowing his nose into Richie’s shoulder, biting down against his collar, a little feral.

“You wanna get me dirty, Trashmouth? That’s not something you’ve tried yet.” Waggles his eyebrows up at him, grinning.

“I don’t even know what that means,” Richie answers, but he’s smiling. He presses his thigh up between Eddie’s legs, even as he curls around him, somehow closer, fingers sliding up into Eddie’s hair at the back of his skull. He rests his forehead against the other man’s, eyes closing.

“Come on my face.” Eddie says like it’s nothing, like he’s asking what’s for breakfast. He kisses the top of his nose and closes his eyes too, heaving an enormous contented sigh as he stretches like a cat and snuggles down into the duvet. “I just want to stay here forever. Can we somehow arrange that?”

“Talk to Bev. Maybe—” he makes a sound like  _ I dunno _ “—perform a sexual favour or two for Ben. ...You are like a cat,” he informs him, voice already hazy with sleep.

“Tactfully ignoring the come on my face suggestion, I see.” He wriggles against him, pulling so that Richie turns over and Eddie curls against his back, shoving one arm under his chest and the other wrapping around his waist so he can hold him. “Wait.” Reaches up with the top arm and takes Richie’s glasses off, folding them and putting them on the nightstand, pressing a kiss to the tendons between his neck and shoulder. “Night, Hon.”

“Don’t have any tact,” Richie whispers into the pillow, by way of good night. And he wraps his fingers around Eddie’s, holds them tight to his chest. He falls asleep the way children do — blink and you miss it. Blink and it’s morning. It’s the best he’s slept since Mike called, and they all went back to Derry.

**~**

The morning is quiet and late and cold, just the way Eddie likes it. He’s wrapped up in one of Ben’s shirts, hanging off his shoulders, curled in the window seat with a steaming cup of coffee in his lap.

“I could live here.” Quietly, curling his toes against the carpet, looking out at the sun peeking through the buildings.

“Hate to break it to ya, darlin’, but a comedian’s salary ain’t gonna compare to this.” Richie, apparently suddenly from Brooklyn, is smoking; shouldn’t be, but he has the taste of it now. He’ll stop when they leave Bev and Ben’s, he thinks. He reaches out for Eddie’s coffee, because he hadn’t bothered to make more or to pour his own.

Eddie swaps the coffee for the cigarette, tucking it into the corner of his mouth. “I think anywhere with a view. With you. And coffee.” Leans back against the window and smiles. “What are we doing today?” Bev had made them eggs, when they’d rolled out of bed, and Eddie can smell her strawberry shower gel. The banana shampoo. “I smell like a fruit salad.”

Richie steps close and presses his face into Eddie’s hair, breathes him in. “You smell like penicillin,” he informs him, and takes a second too long to draw away. He feels like a teenager — him and Eddie just running from something, maybe from Derry, without any clear idea on where they’re going, or how they’ll get there.

His phone buzzes in his pocket and he pulls away to take it out, reading the seventeenth text from Steve. It says WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU and then RICH I SWEAR TO FUCK. Richie turns off his phone. “I’m about to get fired,” he says, and feels nothing. It used to scare him — being shit at comedy, fucking up enough that he couldn’t get another gig. Now he doesn’t care. Genuinely doesn’t.

“You can’t get fired, you’re the boss.” Eddie pulls him to stand between his legs, crossing his ankles — effectively trapping him — and smiles. “Get a new PA.” Tips his face up for kisses, tugging at his shirt. “I’ll do it. I’ll blow you so good in your dressing room.”

“Jeeesus christ,” Richie says, already feeling himself start to get hard, glancing up, but Ben and Bev have disappeared to the grocery store or the liquor store or something like that. They’re alone, for now. He puts a hand in Eddie’s hair, still holding the coffee in the other. “You’re like, uh— you’re kind of an enormous slut,” he says, but he’s grinning, taking the bite out of the word. It’s playful, anyway. He kisses him, sets the coffee down vaguely on the nearest horizontal surface, and then slips the cigarette from Eddie’s fingers.

“No, that career ended in college.” Grinning, nipping at his bottom lip. “Can you blame me?” Eddie pulls away to bite along his jaw, hands slipping from his neck down to squeeze his ass. “Look at you. Quit being a comedian and we’ll go into porn, Hon.”

“Nope, nope,” he says, but he’s laughing. He’s trapped between Eddie’s legs, so when he pulls back he can’t go far. “Who did you sleep with in college?” He’s genuinely curious, he wants to know all the parts of Eddie’s life, all the things he missed and, by rights, shouldn’t have. Fucking Pennywise, fucking Derry. He should have been allowed to know him.

“A lot of dark haired bespectacled little bastards.” Giggles, chasing him when he pulls back. “I told you. I took a boy home from a party and god — I was so drunk anyway but I came and— I went  _ ohh, Richie _ .” Brings his hands around to his front to run them up his stomach. “It was always you, even when I forgot.”

Goosebumps run visibly up Richie's arms. He says “I know what you’re doing,” and his tongue flickers over his lower lip. “It’s working.”

“Oh good.” Eddie twists his hands in his shirt and pulls him down for another kiss, deep and dirty. “Tell me what else I can do to convince you to take me to bed and fuck me til my thighs shake.”

“In Beverly’s house, Eds,” Richie says in a Scandalized voice. “That’s not appropriate,” but he’s absolutely joking, because he drags him up by the front of his shirt, kissing him hard, tongue sliding over Eddie’s, biting down on his lip, dragging it between his teeth. Suddenly he hisses sharply and shakes his hand out, the cigarette burnt down to the filter. It falls to the floor and he swears and picks it up, crushing it out in the ashtray.

“That’s not what I asked.” Eddie crowds into him, lifting his shirt from the bottom to yank it over his head, hands smoothing over his chest and he purrs. “I want to know about you as well. You don’t need to know about all the things I’ve done. You’re going to experience everything.”

Richie straightens his glasses, knocked askew by his shirt collar. “We can’t—” he laughs “in the fucking living room, Eds.” He grabs Eddie by his shirt — Ben’s shirt, and then takes him by the hips instead. It’s so fucking crazy, that they can just do this. That he can reach out and touch. It’s fucking insane.

“Bev’s insisting on Ben taking her for dinner.” He rolls his hips into his and tips his head back. “So you can fuck me over the kitchen sink if you wanted.”

Richie’s eyes go dark, lips parting, but he collects himself fast. Tries to. “Oh, is that what you were thinking of when we were at the Jade?” he asks, because he’s playing the game. He slips his hand down the front of Eddie’s sweatpants and wraps his fingers around his balls.

“Ah! Fuck, cold—“ but his eyes cloud over, gasping as his hips come forward. “At the Jade? Fuck, I was thinking about your hands.” He can’t breathe. He can’t. Remembering how he felt. “I thought about your hands on my th-thighs. Around my throat. I-I just wanted— thought about your fingers in my mouth and—.”

Richie squeezes, gently, slides his hand up to palm his cock. With his free hand, he slides his thumb over Eddie’s lip, then coaxes his jaw open. “You wanted me to fuck your mouth, Eds?” he asks. He had aimed for a joke but it doesn’t come out that way. He pushes two fingers past his teeth, sliding them over his tongue. God, fuck, he’s so soft. Soft like smoke, save the cutting edge of his lower teeth. “You want me to fuck your mouth, now?” Fuck, he wants to. Wants to fuck his mouth with his fingers, keep those large, dark eyes on his as he brings him off.

Eddie’s knees go weak, and his whines. It’s animalistic, the way he clutches at him, the way he sucks his fingers down like he’s made for it. Maybe he is. “I just _want_ , Richie.” He breathes. “I would’ve blown you under the table in front of everyone if you’d asked. Please, god, please.”

He draws his hand out of Eddie’s pants and turns him around, guides him towards the kitchen where Bev and Ben’s coffee cups still sit, not yet cleared away. He pushes Eddie back into the table, one hand cupping the back of his neck. “We should have bought lube,” he says. Officially not a sexy thing to say. Leans down and bites his shoulder.

“You think you’re getting inside me once I get my mouth on you?” Breathless, grinned. “Not a fucking chance, Trashmouth. I want to taste you.” He slides to his knees, shrugging Ben’s shirt off as he goes, legs parted as he kneels before him. Mouths over the trail of hair on his stomach as he undoes Richie’s pants, bites at his hips as he drags them down, hands cool and dry on Richie’s thighs. He looks up at him through his eyelashes and smiles against skin, sucking at the junction of hip and leg to leave a mark.

Richie makes a low, guttural sound in his throat and reaches for something, anything to hang onto, and finds the table. “Fuck,” he manages, fingers of his free hand curling softly into Eddie’s hair. “I used to want to—” he says, and his breath shakes “— um, touch your legs — the insides of your thighs you—” he laughs softly. “Always wore those fucking shorts. Your skin looked so soft— like a girl,” he says, and the smile flutters over his mouth. “Once I dreamt about you— dreamt we were in the hammock, and no one else was there, and I touched you by accident, I think, or you just let me. The back of your knee, and then you let me push my fingers up beneath your shorts just— just a few centimetres, it felt like. I woke up and had to wash my sheets before my mom saw,” he says, and he’s shaking a little. He doesn’t know why doing this makes him, or Eddie, incapable of shutting up. Always one of them ends up babbling.

The noise he makes in response is a keening mirror of Richie’s, slipping lower to run his tongue up the inside of Richie’s thigh. “Here?” Then, “Why didn’t you? I would have let you.” Nibbles at the soft skin, fingers hooking in his boxers and just feeling the heat there. “I would have pretended to protest but you could have convinced me, Hon. God I was ready to spread ‘em that night at the restaurant. If you’d just manhandled me into the back seat of your car that would have been a dream come true.”

“You wouldn’t have let me,” Richie says, and digs his fingers into the back of Eddie’s scalp, desperate for his mouth on him, his breath, anything. “Why didn’t you, back then?” Kiss me, touch me, tell me, let me. But he thinks he knows the reason. The same as his — they were scared. Scared of ruining something, of not being reciprocated... right? Isn’t it?

“Ma would have killed me if I’d gone home with hickeys.” Soft, taking pity on him as he pulls his boxers down to his knees and swirls his tongue over the head of his cock. “And I wasn’t sure how often you washed, back then.” Kisses the tip, “and like you’ve already told me a million times, I was fucking girly.”

“You’re still girly,” he says, but then he chokes out a moan. “I’ll give you a hickey,” he says, nonsensically, and his hips tilt towards Eddie’s mouth. “Jesus,” he breathes again.

_ I’ll show you girly, _ he thinks, breathing in deep through his nose before taking him to the back of his throat, pressing his fingers in at the bruise he’s left on him, hard.  _ I’ll show you girly.  _ He hums around him and uses his hands to pull him closer, deeper.

Richie thinks  _ Holy shit  _ and almost collapses over the table. He doesn’t, somehow — manages to maintain his footing, but he’s clinging to the table and to Eddie’s dark hair for dear life. “Ohfuck, jesus, Eddie,” he breathes, and then he makes an embarrassing noise and thinks that if the others came back right now he probably wouldn’t even fucking pull his pants back up.

Fucking yeah, Eddie thinks, eyebrows canted up almost to his hairline as he breathes through his nose and whines at the taste of him. Musky and salt sea sweet. Moves back, all spit and tongue and lips to lick at him, bringing his eyes up to look at his face. Wants to see this. Needs to see it. Richie’s eyes are closed, lips parted, but he looks down at Eddie when he pulls away, and he softens his fingers in his hair, runs his thumb down over Eddie’s ear. “You’re gonna kill me,” he says, hoarsely.

“Yeah?” Eddie sounds like he’s been sucking dick, voice raw. Runs his tongue along the underside, wrapping his hand around the length of him and stroking slowly. “Tell me what you want, Hon.”

“I like it better when you call me Trashmouth,” he says and has to shut his eyes for a minute to ground himself. “I want to come down your throat,” he tells him, because he does. Because they’re apparently learning all about honesty this fall. “I want to touch you.” Contradicting desires, it seems. He doesn’t care, it spills out of him. He wants a thousand fucking things with Eddie. He has for so many years.

“You seemed to like it when I called you ‘sir’.” Eddie grins before taking him back into his mouth, one hand on his asscheek, eyes wide open and on his face. Richie can have whatever he wants from him. He’s waited long enough.

After that, it really doesn’t take that long. Richie loses the rhythm of his breathing in a handful of seconds, and then he’s not breathing at all as his body tenses, clenches. “Ah, okay,” he says, warns, and he’s holding the back of Eddie’s head softly because somewhere along the way he realizes he was twisting his grip in his hair, desperate and aching and he forces himself to let go. He’s clutching the edge of the table white-knuckled instead. He comes hard, onto his tongue, into the heat of his mouth. It shudders through his body and he grits his jaw against it, teeth grinding, glasses slipping down his nose as he arches over him.

Eddie shudders, bodily, the noise he makes coming from high in his chest through his nose. He remembers doing this in college. Remembers sprinting to the bathroom to spit and brush his teeth. He doesn’t do that. Instead he swallows, and swallows, pressing until his nose is against Richie’s pubic hair, staying while he comes down.  _ Richie Richie Richie _ in his heartbeat, in his veins, under his hands and in his mouth. His knees ache against the floorboards.

“Fuck,” Richie says, when his brain can make cognitive words again, and he jerks, full-bodied, not into Eddie’s mouth, but over the table until one of the cups rattles against a plate of leftover toast crumbs. And then he gently pulls away, drops down to his knees in front of him, taking his face in his hands. His fingers hurt to flex them, but he does anyway, taking Eddie’s face in his hands and kissing him hard. “Let me blow you,” he says, reaching down to palm him through his sweatpants.

“Yes, god, yes. Whatever you want.” Scrambling into his lap, which makes what Richie wants slightly more difficult, but he wants to be... he doesn’t even know. He’s just clutching his face and kissing wherever he can reach, the taste of him still thick on his tongue. “So your PA position is open, right?” He grins, helps Richie get a hand around him by shimmying his sweatpants down to his thighs, and gasps a moan against his jaw.

“Hired, you’re hired,” Richie says, already stroking him off, hard and fast. He says it into his neck, free hand sliding down to grip his ass. He does give him a hickey then, sucking at his throat. He calls the bruises to the surface of his skin, two, then three. Still stroking him, he tips Eddie’s face up with one hand beneath his jaw and sinks his teeth into the soft place above his collarbone where he can see his pulse fluttering.

Eddie cries out, loud, because it hurts and it feels good and it makes him impossibly harder, thrusting into Richie’s hand slowly as he claws his hands against his neck and shivers against him. “Richie please— please—“ because he’s forty and it’s painful and it feels good and he doesn’t know what to do with any of it. “Please.” Almost sobbing.

He thinks he wants Eds up on his feet, wants to suck him off, but he likes this closeness, this warmth, likes the way he smells. He bites his earlobe gently and murmurs, “You going to come for me?” licks his jawline, tongue scraping against stubble not yet shaved. “Hm?”

He knows that the noise pulled from him is basically pornographic, a little high gasp of breath at the very end of a moan -  _ ahh-hu _ \- and ordinarily he’d be embarrassed but this is Richie. Richie talking him through it, stroking him through it, and it never gets old. He nods, once, before it takes him over and he shudders hard against him, face screwed up with the force of it as he spasms and rocks and shakes and tries to say Richie’s name through a closed up throat and a dry mouth.

Richie catches most of it in his hand, makes a sound softly as Eddie comes, like he’s half-feeling it, too. “Fuck, yeah,” he breathes, and kisses his temple, his cheek. And then it’s just their breathing, fast and out of sync, but slowing. He drops his forehead to Eddie’s shoulder and then says, quiet, “My legs are asleep.”

“Fuck, I’m sorry.” He moves backwards and tumbles off of him, limbs wobbling. “Sorry.” Looks around, pulls a folded paper towel off of the table and passes it to Richie, chest heaving. “I... bath? We could— or, Bev said, there’s a hot tub? We could—.” It’s not nerves making him stutter, but the wonderful boneless pleasure within him. “We could smoke up in there and... fuck, I’m old, I want a nap.” Laughs breathlessly, reaching for him.

“I think if I smoked pot in a hot tub I’d pass out, and drown.” Richie says, as he cleans himself up, does up his pants. “Where’s my shirt?” He has to wobble unsteadily into the other room to find it. “What if we,” he says, coming back, running a hand through chaotic curls. “Do these dishes first, since Bev’s house is probably going to smell like a fucking brothel. And then, maybe, bath,” he suggests.

Eddie goes, if possible, even softer. Hikes his sweats back up and takes Richie's face to kiss him sweetly.

The dishes don’t take long with both of them, and Eddie aches with how domestic it is. How much he loves the man standing next to him, dish towel in hand, occasionally swatting him. And the Voices. The holding pairs of bowls to his chest to make him laugh. Eddie’s stomach hurts with it. And he does roll a joint, but he cuts it with tobacco and makes it weak, spraying the living room and kitchen with air freshener before leading Richie up the stairs by the hand.

He undresses him while the bath fills, just a touch too hot, and settles between his legs and against his chest in the water while they share the smoke.

He loves him.

For Richie it is, somehow, entirely different from every other sexual relationship or encounter he’s ever had. For many of them, he didn’t care, going through the motions almost mechanically. It’s not that he doesn’t like women, he does — for many different reasons, plenty of them sexual — but no one has been Eddie.

And maybe that’s not a fair comparison: trying to create bonds, in a short time, similar to the ones Richie has cultivated for years and years with the Losers. Even when he forgot them, he knew that something was missing.

There were some — some women that were special. Women who stayed longer, laughed harder, women who had a touch of the wild to them, but it was like living through a veil, or a mirror. Everything just a little bit off. Like one of them was always half-shadows, and never really quite connected for long. There has been no one, Richie thinks, who would sit with him like this in a bathtub, smoking and talking. No one who makes him sore with sex and sore with laughter, someone he knows, to the very core and at the same time, someone he’s still learning. Eddie at forty is different from Eddie at fourteen. His energy is the same, just directed differently and — christ, it’s the first time in so long — years — that Richie’s felt happy, genuinely happy, even if he is overwhelmed sometimes, and scared often. Above all of that is this sense of security, and love. Love built on something.

Eddie is saying something about pipes — pipes bursting in the cold, and the risk factors of that, and why it’s important to run heat through houses in the winter, and Richie teases him about risk analysis and runs his knuckles lazily over Eddie’s chest, even as Eddie lets out a string of insults and tells him that his job is “fucking important, okay?” Richie just laughs and then, maybe too sincere, too tense with all affection he doesn’t know what to do with, says “I love you,” and then ducks his head to Eddie’s shoulder, exhales against his neck. “Please stop talking about your job. I’m so bored.”

“Well I apologise for having a grown-up job rather than relying on dick jokes for a living.” Sniffily, turning his face into Richie’s cheek and smiling. If Richie wants someone to be exciting, he’s come to the wrong dude, so Eddie assumes that he doesn’t want that. He trails a hand over his knee and turns slightly in his grip to rest against his shoulder, his chest. “I love you, too, you know.”

**Author's Note:**

> join us on tumblr!   
> [**liminalweirdo**](https://liminalweirdo.tumblr.com/) and [**slowlimbs**](https://slowlimbs.tumblr.com/)
> 
> and see you all soon!


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